Blowing the Whistle in Australia is for the birds

Journalists and whistleblowers will go to jail under new national security laws

There was no concerted campaign, no unified push by the media to stop this bill, which dramatically expands the powers of intelligence agencies while creating new offences for disclosing information about their operations.

Journalists will be jailed. It might take a year, or two, or even longer. But journalists and whistleblowers will face prison as a result of the first tranche of national security legislation that was passed in the Senate late on Thursday.

This bill dramatically expands the powers of intelligence agencies while creating new offences for disclosing information about the operations they will undertake using these new powers.

The bill introduces a class of “special intelligence operation” (SIO) for Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) where intelligence officers can gain immunity from prosecution for what would otherwise be a criminal offence.This would affect both journalists and any person who discloses, shares or republishes this material (that intelligence organisations like ASIO have engaged in corrupt or criminal activity).

Public whistleblowing is for the birds. And now public whistleblowing in Australia is formally 'for the birds'. Anonymous Whistleblowing is the way forward. Whistleblowers must learn about TOR, PGP, not using mobile phones (just don't take them with you; turning them off is not enough to disable the GPS), removing metadata from electronic documents and using drop boxes (preferably to non-Australian Newspapers and Journalists to name just a start.

To be a successful anonymous whistleblower a person must remain anonymous. Simple, but difficult. The secret cannot be disclosed to anyone. Telling even one person is too many. Anonymous means Anonymous.

The list of public whistleblowers who have been killed, jailed or forced to live in exile is very long. Edward Snowden, Julian Assanage, Chelsea Manning, Thomas Drake, Jeffrey Sterling, Karen Silkwood and many more too numerous to mention.

The list of anonymous whistleblowers who have been killed, jailed or forced to live in exile: None,Naught, Nix, Nada, Niente.